Letter: Don’t leave out Upstate stoners

Asssemblyman David Gantt, D-Rochester, sent a letter to top lawmakers urging them not to restrict a clarification of the state’s marijuana laws to just New York City. Under the outlines of a deal that I reported yesterday, the state budget might authorize the New York City Council to change the law, which advocates and downstate law enforcement officials say closes a “loophole” that unfairly stigmatizes young black and Hispanic men.

Right now, possession of 25 grams of marijuana or less is just a violation — like a traffic ticket — that doesn’t lead to arrest or criminal charges. (In Albany this week, it’s being referred to as “a Katz.”) But if you possess the marijuana “in public view,” police can charge you with a misdemeanor. Prosecutors say this was intended to be a deterrent against smoking marijuana in public, but many people are emptying their pockets — at police direction — and getting hit with a harsher charge as a result of stops in the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk program.

“A law specific to New York City would not only be grossly unfair to the rest of New York state’s population, but would deliver an exclusive and partial solution to the statewide problems surrounding needless arrests for possessing small amounts of marijuana,” Gantt writes in the letter. “Please forward a budget that accounts for all New Yorkers and decriminalize possession of small quantities of marijuana throughout New York State.”

The letter was signed by 29 Democratic lawmakers, mostly from the Assembly. It includes several representatives from Upstate America, including Gantt and Sam Roberts from Rochester, Al Stirpe of Syracuse, Donna Lupardo of Binghamton, Kevin Cahill from Kingston and Frank Skartados of Newburgh.

No one from the Capital Region signed, but law enforcement officials here have said it isn’t really an issue. Indeed: the state’s top lawmakers have said the vast majority of arrests for the “public view” marijuana happen in the five boroughs.

“That’s not the biggest issue in my district,” explained Assemblyman John McDonald, D-Cohoes, who declined to sign on to the letter.